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The Midwest Center for Investigative ReportingWed, 19 Jun 2019 18:11:08 +0000en-US
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1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.2.3On your dinner plate and in your body: The most dangerous pesticide you’ve never heard ofhttps://investigatemidwest.org/2019/06/19/on-your-dinner-plate-and-in-your-body-the-most-dangerous-pesticide-youve-never-heard-of/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/06/19/on-your-dinner-plate-and-in-your-body-the-most-dangerous-pesticide-youve-never-heard-of/#respondWed, 19 Jun 2019 18:11:06 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=213650Chlorpyrifos - scientists say there is no acceptable dose to avoid brain damage. Its use is banned in several European countries. Yet its residues are found in fruit baskets, on dinner plates, and in human urine samples from all over Europe. Now producers are pushing for a renewed EU-approval - perhaps in vain.

]]> Harvest of melons in the province of Murcia in Spain. Photo Marcos García Rey

Scientists say there is no acceptable dose to avoid brain damage. Its use is banned in several European countries. Yet its residues are found in fruit baskets, on dinner plates, and in human urine samples from all over Europe. Now producers are pushing for a renewed EU-approval - perhaps in vain.

The name is chlorpyrifos. Here is why the chemical and its risks are almost unknown to the public.

Chlorpyrifos kills insects on growing vegetables and fruit.

Thomas Backhaus, professor for ecotoxicology and environmental science at the University of Gothenburg, says that the substance took a long time to be recognised as one of the ”nasty” ones.

”In comparison with glyphosate, the active substance in Roundup, chlorpyrifos has been flying under the radar. When we talk of herbicides like glyphosate that kill weed humans can cope because we don’t have chlorophyll and don’t get directly affected. When we talk about insecticides, you have the problem that they affect all developing animals, including humans,” he says.

In the greenhouses and under the carpets they produce all kind of vegetables in El Ejido, a province of Almeria in Spain. Photo Marcos García Rey

Thomas Backhaus’ concerns are well known in academic circles and shared by other researchers. Philippe Grandjean, professor in environmental medicine at the University of Southern Denmark and Harvard School of Public Health in the USA, notes that brain damages connected to chlorpyrifos have been found at the lowest detectable dose.

”That means by definition that you can’t define a dose tolerable for consumption – that dose must be zero,” he says.

The poisonous effect of chlorpyrifos on insects is not disputed. The unresolved question is to what extent the usage of chlorpyrifos is dangerous to all living organisms like fish in nearby waters or farm workers in the fields, or to anybody eating the treated products.

The spread

Tests of food samples in all EU-countries in 2016 show chlorpyrifos and chlorpyrifos-methyl in 5.5 percent of the 76,200 samples, as recorded by EU-institution EFSA (European Food Safety Agency). If we look only on randomly sampled unprocessed plant based food products in EU, the percentage is 6.2 according to Pesticide Action Network Europe.

In the samples recorded by EFSA 374 contained chlorpyrifos or chlorpyrifos-methyl above the Maixmal Residue Limit (MRL).

In 2013 Swedish researchers reported findings of chlorpyrifos and other pesticides in urine from middle-aged women, a group with a high intake of fruits and vegetables. Chlorpyrifos has never been registered for agricultural use in Sweden. In countries where the use of chlorpyrifos is banned the pesticide never the less reaches consumers through the free movement of goods on the international market.

In 2016 studies for the Danish Ministry of Environment found chlorpyrifos in the urine from nine out of ten children and their mothers. The researchers suggested a possible connection between chlorpyrifos and development of ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder).

In Wallonia, the French speaking part of Belgium, the Public Service Scientific Institutein 2018 found residues of chlorpyrifos in 100 percent of urine samples from 258 schoolchildren aged 9-12.

A recent study in California connect autism and early brain damage in children with prenatal and infant exposure of chlorpyrifos. A child’s risk of brain damage increases if its mother had been exposed to the pesticide by living nearby sprayed fields, the study found.

The California study published in March 2019 has triggered a ban of chlorpyrifos in the US’ largest agricultural state. Five other US-states; Hawaii, Oregon, New York, Connecticut and New Jersey have announced or decided similar bans.

In Europe the scientific debate over chlorpyrifos is hardly known outside expert circles and the decision process about allowing or banning pesticides is difficult to track and to follow.

EU countries follow common decisions on whether to approve a substance like chlorpyrifos or not. Chlorpyrifos has been approved on an EU-level since 2006 while decisions to allow products with the active substance, and the use of them, are up to the member states.

Eight member states have banned, or never authorised the use of chlorpyrifos products: Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia and Sweden. United Kingdom banned the use of chlorpyrifos with one exception in 2016. Chlorpyrios is not authorised in Norway, nor in Iceland. The Swiss government decided to withdraw permissions for 12 chlorpyrifos and chlorpyrifos-methyl products 12 June, according to newspaper Tagblatt.

As goods within the EU are supposed to move freely across national borders treated food gets spread around. That’s why consumers might find vegetables and fruit treated with chlorpyrifos in their grocery stores even if such treatment has never been allowed in the country.

A pan-European alert system has been set up for national authorities to notify other authorities on findings of hazardous food. These alerts often come after suspicious products have been sold – and consumed.

How companies have a say

Evaluation of possible health and environmental hazards are primarily based on studies paid for by the producers. In the case of chlorpyrifos the main producer has been Dow Chemicals, now Corteva Agriscience, formerly the agricultural division of DowDuPont. Corteva Agriscience turned into a standalone company 1 June 2019.

”The producers’ role is obvious and well known to the scientific community. The present EU-assessment of chlorpyrifos is to a large extent based on hundreds of studies financed and submitted by Dow,” says Axel Mie, associate professor at Karolinska Institute, Department of Clinical Science and Education Stockholm.

With colleagues Christina Rudén and Philippe Grandjean, Axel Mie has initiated a scientific debate. The three environmental scientists claim that data from Dow Chemicals’ own research back in 2000 actually showed that chlorpyrifos has an impact of the development of cerebellum (”little brain”) in rats. These findings had however not been recorded in the conclusions filed to the EU-authorities.

Scientists behind the criticised studies reject these claims. They argue the loss of brain weight in rats can be explained by the brains’ fixation in formaldehyde before being measured, and that no pesticide control product has been more thoroughly evaluated.

In the debate published by scientific journal Environmental Health, where Philippe Grandjean is one of the editors-in-chief, the defenders of chlorpyrifos first stated they had no competing interests. In a correction posted in May 2019, they declared that at the time of their submission to the journal, they were employed by Dow Chemicals, the primary registrant and manufacturer of chlorpyrifos.

We have asked Corteva Agriscience for comments on the allegations above specified in the following questions:

· Is the description of the debate in Environmental Health accurate?

· Was the hiding of the employment status of the scientists an intentional omission? Could it have been handled differently to minimize perceptions of impropriety?

· How does Corteva see challenges with the current system where companies finance research that the US, EU and others base decision on?

· Does Corteva have any other comments about criticism from environmental scientists and NGOs opposing its products, or comments you want to make on the benefits of protecting all kinds of crops.

Corteva Agriscience chose to answer with two statements in writing:

”Chlorpyrifos is one of the most widely studied crop protection products in the world and is currently registered in roughly 100 countries, including the U.S., all major U.S. trading partners and in the EU. Policy should be driven by sound science and data and follow a predictable and transparent regulatory review process.

Labelled uses of chlorpyrifos rest on five decades of experience in use, health surveillance of manufacturing workers and applicators, and more than 4,000 studies and reports examining the product in terms of health, safety and the environment.”

Not for us to know

The present EU- approval of chlorpyrifos expires 31 January 2020. This could indicate the story of chlorpyrifos is coming to an end.

Yet that is not necessarily the case.

Market analysts project that the sale of chlorpyrifos will see signifcant growth in the next five years, according to Persistance Market Research which will release a new report in August.

Experts from EU-member countries Spain and Poland have since May 2017 prepared a reassessment of chlorpyrifos and related chlorpyrifos-methyl for a possible new acceptance in the autumn before the present approval ends.

There are five companies producing chlorpyrifos registered in Spain including Dow, now Corteva. One of the five is FMC Corporation which until 2016 manufactured chlorpyrifos at its plant Cheminova in Denmark where chlorpyrifos is not allowed to use.

The bulk of a draft reassessment report has been open for comments. It consists of some thousand pages filling close to 90 Megabit of data when downloaded from the homepage of EFSA (European Food Safety Agency). Not all of it is readable though. The proposed decision by Spain and Poland is not accessible, as shown below:

This black out of central information is done by EFSA which has the job of preparing the forthcoming EU decision.

But is EFSA legally justified in keeping this information under wraps? The Aarhus convention a pan-European UN-convention from 1998 has been binding EU-law since 2003. This law says information related to emissions to the environment must not be withheld on the ground of protecting commercial interests.

This was underlined by the EU court in Luxembourg in March 2019. The court said information concerning the herbicide glyphosate, known under the product name Roundup, could not be held back by EFSA.

With reference to the glyphosate-judgement we have asked EFSA to release the proposed decision on chlorpyrifos – answer pending at the time of writing.

The “cemetery” of pesticide tins pollutes the soil and the near Mediterranean sea (El Ejido, Southern Spain).Photo Marcos García Rey

The anonymous lawmakers

On top of the known spread, the scientists’ warnings, the producers’ role, and the restricted public information there is one more aspect of chlorpyrifos to be unfolded; how the EU will decide either to ban or to approve the future for the disputed pesticide.

Followers of EU-politics will know the two legislative institutions are the Council, representing the member states, and the Parliament representing the peoples of Europe. This does not apply for approval of pesticides. Here the final decision will be taken by a committee of national experts on the suggestion of the European Commission, a non-elected body of civil servants.

Lithuanian Vytenis Andriukaitis is commissioner for health and food safety. Below him is the Commission’s Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety headed by Anne Bucher, and below her the directorate for health and food audits and analysis, and so on. The actual evaluation of chlorpyrifos will be done by the unit for pesticides and biocides, at the 6th levels from the top in the hierarchy.

”But, other directorate-general will also be consulted before the final decision, ” says an EU Commission spokesperson.

This committee can reject the Commission’s proposal if it’s members can form the necessary majority. Should that happen the Commissions can turn to an Appeal committee for a re-assessment.

At the time of writing it is known when meetings are scheduled for the relevant committee. The agenda for these meetings is not. We are not supposed to know who the participants in these meetings are. What suggestion they will be asked to consider is still officially unknown.

Nevertheless a Commission source indicates:

”The Commission won’t go forward with the renewal of the authorisation because the health concerns are very clear"

Adding to this, NGO PAN Europe said:

”We’ve heard in the corridor that chlorpyrifos doesn’t meet the approval criteria.”

The Cross-border investigation on chlorpyrifos was initiated by Investigative Reporting Denmark and Danwatch, and made in collaboration with journalists from Knack in Belgium, Le Monde in France, Dagbladet in Norway, Newsweek in Poland, Oštro in Slovenia, El Confidential in Spain and The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting in the US. The investigation was supported by Journalismfund.eu.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/06/19/on-your-dinner-plate-and-in-your-body-the-most-dangerous-pesticide-youve-never-heard-of/feed/0Opinion: Are you ready to eat gene-edited food? It’s arrived…https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/05/08/opinion-are-you-ready-to-eat-gene-edited-food-its-arrived/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/05/08/opinion-are-you-ready-to-eat-gene-edited-food-its-arrived/#respondWed, 08 May 2019 17:11:40 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=204672A Midwest restaurant is buying Calyno™ High Oleic Soybean Oil from Calyxt that fashions itself as a “consumer-centric, food- and agriculture-focused company.” It is also the first commercial use of a gene-edited food in the U.S.

]]>So you decide to
take your significant other on a special date to celebrate (pick an
event). You head out to your fav Midwest
restaurant and order a fried chicken sandwich, and salad with ranch dressing. The meal is delicious, the evening wonderful.

Only later (when
your friend who works at the restaurant tells you) do you learn that the
chicken is fried with gene-edited soybeans and ingredient one on the ranch
dressing is you guessed it – is also gene-edited.

WHAT?

I know what you're
thinking. Dickey you're making it
up. Except I'm not.

A Midwest restaurant is buying Calyno High Oleic Soybean Oil from Calyxt that fashions itself as a “consumer-centric, food- and agriculture-focused company.”

It is also the first commercial use of a gene-edited food in the U.S. Although the soybean oil is most definitely genetically modified Calyxt calls the product non-GMO. We'll try not to get too wonky here but stay with us. The soybeans are gene-edited by a tool called TALEN, which is a predecessor to other gene-editing tools like CRISPER-Cas9 (As an aside, there's a huge ongoing debate among scientists about the merits of each.)

You can imagine TALEN as a pair of DNA scissors that cuts and binds DNA sequences to create a desired trait. In Calyxt's case high-oleic soybeans. Calyxt deactivated or cut out two genes to create the new soybeans.

For Calyxt there is
another very attractive attribute; the tool is proprietary avoiding the huge
world wide squabble of who owns and can sell CRISPER.

For Calyxt the
soybeans are genetically enhanced through gene-editing rather than the
traditional transgenesis GMO process.

Calyxt says the
gene-edited soybeans contain no trans-fat and have a longer shelf life than
traditionally modified GMO soybeans.

The gene-edited
soybeans were grown last year by 78 farmers in Iowa, South Dakota, and
Minnesota.

“In 2019, the agency intends to publish guidance to
clarify the FDA’s regulatory approach to the regulation of intentional genomic
alterations in animals, including through genome editing. This regulatory
approach would be characterized by risk-based categories that include: an FDA
decision not to enforce approval requirements with no prior review, an FDA
decision not to enforce approval requirements following a review of data that
address specific risk questions, and an FDA decision to review for approval with
data requirements proportionate to the risk associated with the particular
product.”

Well...welcome to
the party.

So let's recap. We got a new technology moving at light speed
which is guaranteed to be the new normal real soon and the feds playing catch
up. And where gene-edited soybeans are
being sold is a secret. Kind of a rough
and bumpy beginning. Don't you think?

About Dave Dickey

Dickey spent nearly 30 years at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s NPR member station WILL-AM 580 where he won a dozen Associated Press awards for his reporting. For 13 years, he directed Illinois Public Media’s agriculture programming. His weekly column for Big Ag Watch covers agriculture and related issues including politics, government, environment and labor. Email him at dave.dickey@investigatemidwest.org.

This column reflects the writer’s own opinions and not those of Big Ag Watch.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/05/08/opinion-are-you-ready-to-eat-gene-edited-food-its-arrived/feed/0Opinion: The NCBA needs to lighten up when it comes to cell-based technologyhttps://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/17/opinion-the-ncba-needs-to-lighten-up-when-it-comes-to-cell-based-technology/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/17/opinion-the-ncba-needs-to-lighten-up-when-it-comes-to-cell-based-technology/#respondWed, 17 Apr 2019 17:45:30 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=200199Enter the National Cattlemen's Beef
Association and the highly anticipated joint agreement between the Food and Drug Administration and United States Agriculture Department over oversight of
cell-based meat technology.

The deal – released last month – calls for FDA and USDA to each do what they do best. FDA will regulate cell collection, cell banks, and differentiation.

]]>In Shakespeare's play Hamlet Act III, Scene II
there is this memorable exchange:

Player
Queen:
Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife, If once I be a widow, ever I be a
wife!

Player
King:
'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here a while, My spirits grow dull, and fain
I would beguile the tedious day with sleep.

Player
Queen:

Sleep
rock thy brain, And never come mischance between us twain!

Hamlet:

Madam,
how like you this play?

Queen:

The lady
doth protest too much, methinks.

To “protest” in Shakespeare's day meant to
vow. Queen Gertrude is suggesting that the player queen is trying too hard to
convince the audience that her vows are true and in the process loses her
credibility.

Enter the National Cattlemen's Beef
Association and the highly anticipated joint agreement between the Food and
Drug Administration and United States Agriculture Department over oversight of
cell-based meat technology.

The deal – released last month – calls for FDA
and USDA to each do what they do best.
FDA will regulate cell collection, cell banks, and differentiation.

Good Food Institute: “We are excited about the opportunities this
agreement affords for American agricultural producers to provide innovative
methods of producing products that meet American consumers' desires for
healthy, humane, and sustainable protein sources.”

Memphis
Meats (a cell-based meat start up company): "Demand for meat is projected to double
by 2050, and every stakeholder we speak with, regardless of production method,
shares the goal of feeding our growing planet in a safe and sustainable way. As
consumer interest for cell-based meat continues to grow, we will work with both
FDA and USDA to bring safe and truthfully labeled products to market."

North American Meat Institute: "We support a fair and competitive
marketplace that lets consumers decide what food products make sense for them
and their families, and this agreement will help achieve these goals by
establishing the level playing field necessary to ensure consumer
confidence."

Okay...that's a lot of gushing. And let's state the obvious. There's bound to be some growing pains in
this USDA-FDA partnership which now must develop joint principles for day-to-day
operations.

But the NCBA is not happy. Really not happy.

After the USDA-FDA announcement in March, NCBA President Jennifer Houston had this to
say, “The formal agreement announced today solidifies USDA’s lead oversight
role in the production and labeling of lab-grown fake meat products. Ensuring that all lab-grown fake meat
products are safe and accurately labeled remains NCBA’s top priority.”

All that angst is beyond the pale and makes
one wonder exactly what NCBA truly fears about cell-based meats.

Truth be told cell based meat when it reaches
the plate is meat. It comes from
harvested meat cells rather than a slaughterhouse.

The NCBA doth protest too much methinks.

About Dave Dickey

Dickey spent nearly 30 years at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s NPR member station WILL-AM 580 where he won a dozen Associated Press awards for his reporting. For 13 years, he directed Illinois Public Media’s agriculture programming. His weekly column for Big Ag Watch covers agriculture and related issues including politics, government, environment and labor. Email him at dave.dickey@investigatemidwest.org.

This column reflects the writer’s own opinions and not those of Big Ag Watch.

]]>If you are like me you probably don't like your chicken nuggets with a side of plastic and metallic surprises. It's been a bad twelve months for Big Ag companies.

USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service says in 2018 there have been dozens of recalls involving millions of pounds of sausage, calzones and chicken whatnots contaminated with metal, plastic and other foreign non-food bits of dangerous materials.

For all 30 voluntary recalls in our sample, after FDA first became aware that an adulterated or misbranded product could be in the food supply chain, it did not prescribe a timeline for each firm to initiate a recall. For two recalls, the firms did not initiate the recall of all potentially harmful products until 165 days and 81 days after FDA became aware of the potential.

As long as I can remember Big Ag companies have been slow on the draw in voluntarily recalls, notifying the federal government when consumers have complained about weird (and sometimes dangerous stuff) is in their food.

Rather than take consumer complaint at face value Big Ag acts self-righteously.

FSIS is encouraging Big Ag food producers to implement the new guidelines immediately, although there is a 60-day public comment period that could lead to some tweaking.

It's about time.

About Dave Dickey

Dickey spent nearly 30 years at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s NPR member station WILL-AM 580 where he won a dozen Associated Press awards for his reporting. For 13 years, he directed Illinois Public Media’s agriculture programming. His weekly column for Big Ag Watch covers agriculture and related issues including politics, government, environment and labor. Email him at dave.dickey@investigatemidwest.org.

This column reflects the writer’s own opinions and not those of Big Ag Watch.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/03/opinion-new-federal-food-recall-guidelines-may-improve-food-safety/feed/0Opinion: Jury still out on whether Costco’s chicken experiment will flyhttps://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/03/opinion-jury-still-out-on-whether-costcos-chicken-experiment-will-fly/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/03/opinion-jury-still-out-on-whether-costcos-chicken-experiment-will-fly/#respondWed, 03 Apr 2019 18:48:40 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=197398Costco sells its rotisserie chicken at the back of its stores at a loss to lure customers into the story to buy other things. Up until now those chickens by and large have come from Big Ag poultry producers like Tyson, Pilgrims Pride, and Perdue. But Costco is now bringing chicken production in house.

Those sentiments jumped to this side of the pond, becoming something of a point of debate in the 1928 presidential campaign between Herbert Hoover and Al Smith.

Turns out the Republican party in support of Hoover purchased campaign advertisements stating “Republican prosperity has reduced hours and increased eating capacity, silenced discontent, put proverbial “chicken in every pot.”

Smith mocked the ad on the campaign trail, suggesting the average working man could not afford a chicken dinner every Sunday – an argument while certainly true didn't win him the election.

Enter Costco which absolutely adores its $4.99 rotisserie deal. The chicken is so popular with the public that it has its own Facebook page.

In 2014, Costco reported selling 78 million of these processed, four-pound birds a year.

Costco sells its rotisserie chicken at the back of its stores at a loss to lure customers into the story to buy other things.

Up until now those chickens by and large have come from Big Ag poultry producers like Tyson, Pilgrims Pride, and Perdue.

But Costco is now bringing chicken production in house.

This September the warehouse superstore will open a 250,000 square foot processing plant, and 75,000 square foot hatchery and feedmill in Fremont Nebraska.

The plant is expected to process in excess of 2 million chickens a week and provide up to 43 percent of all rotisserie chicken sales and about a third of raw bird sales.

The complex has a $300 million dollar price tag, but Costco executives say in-house production will save as much as 35 cents a bird. And that ain't chicken feed.

But is it a good idea? And will other major food retailers (think Walmart) follow? I believe the retail industry will be watching closely. If Costco is successful, it’s a given that the competition will need to rethink its ag supply chains.

As to the business model … well Costco will need to ink contracts with about 125 poultry farmers to source all those chickens.

Essentially the farmers sign 15-year contracts to work for Costco. And that has some farmer trade groups up in arms.

“Here you have a retailer who will now—from cradle to grave—have complete control of the entire production system, They’ll own the birds, they’ll control all of the particulars of the birds’ genetics, the production. They’ll own the feed mill and they’ll have control of the processing plant. If this model works, what will it mean for the rest of the poultry industry? Will other retailers, like Walmart, be close behind?”

All this to keep Costco rotisserie chicken flowing to the public at $4.99 a pop?

Well … it will be quite a while before we know whether its a good deal for would be Costco chicken producers. New poultry farmers will bear all the up front risks of building new barns.

The plan assumes Costco won't ever cut production. That's not a given. The public is fickle. A chicken in every pot today may be nothing more than cobwebs tomorrow.

As for Costco ... assuming the retailer is successful in the eyes of its rivals vertical integration may become the new normal – not just for chickens but perhaps other foods.

We can't even begin to weigh what unforeseen, unintended consequences such a food production system will unleash.

About Dave Dickey

Dickey spent nearly 30 years at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s NPR member station WILL-AM 580 where he won a dozen Associated Press awards for his reporting. For 13 years, he directed Illinois Public Media’s agriculture programming. His weekly column for Big Ag Watch covers agriculture and related issues including politics, government, environment and labor. Email him at dave.dickey@investigatemidwest.org.

This column reflects the writer’s own opinions and not those of Big Ag Watch.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/04/03/opinion-jury-still-out-on-whether-costcos-chicken-experiment-will-fly/feed/0EPA considers change that could handicap states as they struggle to control dicamba damagehttps://investigatemidwest.org/2019/03/20/epa-considers-change-that-could-handicap-states-as-they-struggle-to-control-dicamba-damage/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/03/20/epa-considers-change-that-could-handicap-states-as-they-struggle-to-control-dicamba-damage/#respondWed, 20 Mar 2019 23:23:18 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=194915The Environmental Protection Agency is considering limiting a regulation states use to protect farmers and residents from plant damage caused by a controversial pesticide known as dicamba. The EPA announced Tuesday it’s re-evaluating how it reviews requests under section 24(c) of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). States and other local municipalities submit […]

The Environmental Protection Agency is considering limiting a regulation states use to protect farmers and residents from plant damage caused by a controversial pesticide known as dicamba.

The EPA announced Tuesday it’s re-evaluating how it reviews requests under section 24(c) of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). States and other local municipalities submit Special Local Needs (SLN) requests to the agency when additional considerations are needed for using a pesticide in a more localized area.

In recent years, states have used this to rule to limit the use of dicamba, a chemical that has proven useful in controlling weeds resistant to other pesticides, but that has also damaged trees, non-resistance row crops and other sensitive plants.

On March 1, the Illinois Department of Agriculture announced that no dicamba could be applied to soybean fields after June 30. The state also added new requirements for training and clarified rules about buffer zones around fields.

But less than a month later, the EPA has clarified that the FIFRA regulation is intended for additional uses, not to limit a pesticide’s application.

“The fact that some states have instead used 24(c) to implement cut-off dates (and/or impose other restrictions), EPA is now re-evaluating its approach to reviewing 24(c) requests and the circumstances under which it will exercise its authority to disapprove those requests,” the EPA said in a statement.

Arkansas, Illinois, Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota have applied additional restrictions to dicamba use in the 2019 season. Additionally, Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, North Carolina, have considered adding restrictions on applying the chemical to soybeans.

Dicamba has been approved to prevent weeds in soybeans since 2017. It’s been used on corn since the 1960s.

Complaints about damage from dicamba have grown exponentially since 2017, according to state data. In Illinois, complaints grew from an annual average of 133 to more than 500 in 2018. More than 300 of those were attributed to dicamba.

The EPA said its decision shouldn’t affect any requests already approved in 2018. The agency also said it plans to accept public comments on any new approaches before implementing them.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/03/20/epa-considers-change-that-could-handicap-states-as-they-struggle-to-control-dicamba-damage/feed/0Most nitrate, coliform in Kewaunee County wells tied to animal wastehttps://investigatemidwest.org/2019/03/06/most-nitrate-coliform-in-kewaunee-county-wells-tied-to-animal-waste/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/03/06/most-nitrate-coliform-in-kewaunee-county-wells-tied-to-animal-waste/#respondWed, 06 Mar 2019 19:01:14 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=191951The latest findings from a study of drinking water wells and their surroundings finds manure from cows that is stored or spread on farm fields poses the highest risk for certain contaminants.

“Where we see the strong relationships, the strong linkages, those are with agricultural factors. So that would suggest that agriculture is primarily responsible for those two contaminants,” he said in an interview.

Borchardt presented his updated findings on the risk factors associated with contamination in wells at the Midwest Manure Summit in Green Bay on Wednesday. In 2017, his research found over 60 percent of wells sampled in Kewaunee County were contaminated with fecal microbes, which can come from both septic systems or animal waste.

The new study aims to understand the precise sources of contamination and how certain factors can reduce or increase the risk of tainted drinking water. Borchardt used models to predict how those factors — like the distance of a well from a manure lagoon or agricultural field, weather and the quality of well construction — can impact contamination levels.

Borchardt’s study found that the No. 1 risk factor for contamination was the proximity of a well to a manure storage pit. Borchardt said the closest well in the study was 150 feet from a manure pit, but even wells three miles away still have some risk of being contaminated with coliform.

Borchardt called coliform an “indicator bacteria” for the presence of other bacteria and pathogens.

According to state regulations, manure lagoons are allowed to leak 500 gallons per acre, per day. Borchardt said contamination of nearby wells may be due to leakage from the lagoon, as well as the tendency of farmers to spread liquid manure close to the location of their pits.

A view of Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy in Kewaunee County, Wisconsin, as seen from Google Earth. The manure storage pits can be seen in the center, and bottom of the photo.

According to a spreadsheet of permitted manure storage pits in Kewaunee County from 2017, some of the largest pits for which dimensions were listed span more than 4 acres. Borchardt said there are around 270 manure pits in the county.

“(The findings give) policy makers and other stakeholders interested in working on solutions the information they need to think about solutions, instead of just saying ‘Hey, your wells are contaminated,’ ” Borchardt said.

The contaminants investigated were nitrate, coliform bacteria, human fecal microbes, bovine fecal microbes and other fecal microbes regardless of the source. The models accounted for the effects of multiple risk factors at the same time.

Don Niles, a Kewaunee County dairy farmer and president of the nonprofit Peninsula Pride Farms, said the findings “…tell me that we need to come up with better management practices, working together as farmers to find out how we can reduce nitrates in areas where they tend to be concentrated.”

Niles’ group advocates for practices such as applying manure to fields twice a year rather than once in order to minimize nitrate density, and planting cover crops to absorb more manure.

He said for farmers, solving the problem may not be straightforward

“In some cases (we’re) changing farming practices that are over 100 years old, and we want to make sure we’re going in the right direction and not the wrong direction,” Niles said.

Kewaunee County, where cattle outnumber people nearly 5 to 1, is a focal point in Wisconsin over whether local, state and federal governments adequately protect drinking water from manure from dairy farms, especially in areas of fractured bedrock, which is common in northeastern Wisconsin. The fractured bedrock allows for water to easily infiltrate to the subsurface, especially after rain or snowmelt.

The contamination of drinking water by manure has become a key political issue in Wisconsin, with Gov. Tony Evers declaring 2019 “the year of clean drinking water.” In recent years, the struggling dairy industry has consolidated and increased production, with smaller farms closing and Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) expanding to house thousands of cows.

The average dairy cow has gotten larger, eats more and produces more manure. As cows are concentrated in certain areas, their manure is too. And that is causing major problems.

Nancy Utesch, a Kewaunee County beef farmer and member of advocacy group Kewaunee Cares, says the results of the new study show the existing manure rules and enforcement are not strong enough.

“A lot of this pollution is from intentional, deliberate actions that are not best management practices that do a lot of harm. Like spreading close to waterways, spreading when you know rain is going to happen … and overapplication (of manure),” she said. “And I think we really need to stop digging manure pits. This is from the dark ages. Stop permitting them. All manure pits leak — it’s just a matter of when.”

Shelly Mayer, executive director of Professional Dairy Producers of Wisconsin, said assigning blame will not solve the problem. She wants stakeholders to come up with ways to produce food with less water pollution. Mayer called for a “holistic approach.”

“We have to focus on solutions, and be realistic that the minute we’re born, we all have an impact on our environment,” she said. “We all want to source our food locally … where we know the farmer and have oversight over that food.”

Among Borchardt’s findings:

Septic systems were not linked with coliform and nitrate contamination, suggesting the sources of these contaminants are agricultural.

Coliform bacteria contamination is linked with how close a well is to a manure lagoon.

High nitrate contamination (greater than the health limit of 10 parts per million) is linked to presence of agricultural fields around a well, distance to the nearest agricultural field, distance to nearest manure lagoon and depth to bedrock.

The higher the number of septic system drain fields around a well, the greater the probability of the well becoming contaminated with human waste.

The timing of the research is significant, as the Legislature’s new bipartisan Water Quality Task Force is aimed at investigating how to improve drinking water in Wisconsin. Among the strategies to be considered: best practices for soil mapping and data collection; identifying sources of contamination; better management of runoff; and improving well and septic system construction. Rep. Joel Kitchens, R-Sturgeon Bay, whose district includes Kewaunee County, is a member of the task force.

Borchardt plans to repeat the same study in southwest Wisconsin with a team of researchers. His recent study showed 42 percent of private wells tested in Iowa, Grant and Lafayette counties were contaminated.

Said Utesch: “The general population of Wisconsin is really tired of getting together and talking about doing another study and work group. If I had something to say to Tony Evers it would be ‘We want to see action now.’ ”

Sarah Whites-Koditschek is a Wisconsin Public Radio Mike Simonson Memorial Investigative Fellow embedded in the newsroom of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. The nonprofit Center (www.WisconsinWatch.org) collaborates with Wisconsin Public Radio, Wisconsin Public Television, other news media and the UW-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication. All works created, published, posted or disseminated by the Center do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of UW-Madison or any of its affiliates.

Problems the Iowa State Auditor’s office identified in a 2012 audit and subsequent reports and recommendations for investigating Iowa’s pesticide use violations still linger years later.

The Iowa Legislature has not changed state law on some fees the state Department of Agriculture Land Stewardship Pesticide Bureau charges licensed pesticide distributors and applicators. In other instances, applicators do not take continuing education classes in the same year they apply.

Explanations exist for some of the concerns. For example, applicators take continuing education after harvest and before the next spring’s planting season during what is called the crop year, which runs Oct. 1 through Sept. 30, instead of the calendar year when they apply for a license.

“It’s not that they don’t attend training,” Gretchen Paluch, the pesticide bureau’s chief, said. “They do, and we hold those applicators to that standard. It’s just an inconsistency between a calendar date and a crop-year date.”

However, the absence of legislative action on the unaligned calendars and other matters in the auditor reports keep concerns alive about how Iowa best can regulate pesticide spraying.

State law says private, non-commercial pesticide applicators may take six hours of continuing education in the years they have been applying pesticides in order to keep their state certification after passing a three-year certification test.

But the continuing education for third year of that certification period gets pushed into the next year, after certification has expired. Pesticide bureau-approved classes for private applicators are offered in January through April, after a harvest that keeps farmers in the fields but before the next spraying season. Bureau administrative rules allow that as a practical matter.

The audits also said Iowa’s pesticide bureau should have more than one person to update applicator licenses and to oversee collection of inspection fees paid to the bureau. Some of those fees, which cover a small part of the bureau’s operation, haven’t been raised for almost 30 years.

Paluch said a lot of the changes necessary to address the reports’ concerns would require statutory changes and are out of her bureau’s control. They include raising fees for bureau services or adjusting dates in the code to better work with the bureau’s practical schedule for re-certification exams.

“That’s not something we get to choose,” she said. “That would have to pass at the Legislature.”

However, State House Agriculture Committee Chairman Ross Paustian (R-Walcott) said no legislation is pending to address the pesticide bureau in the 2019 session.

Rep. Ross Paustian (R-Walcott)

“IDALS (the Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship) or the
pesticide bureau can request a bill but I have not seen one yet,” Paustian
wrote in an email to IowaWatch.

Although no bill is pending in the state Senate either, Sen. Dan Zumbach,
chairman of the Agriculture Committee there, told IowaWatch in an email he
has had conversations with the agriculture and land stewardship department
on what appropriate fee levels should be.

The pesticide bureau received 338 complaints for a variety of reasons, ranging from pesticide misuse to requiring information assistance, from Oct. 1, 2017, through Sept. 30, 2018. The bureau decided that 251 required on-site investigati0ns of pesticide misuse during that time.

THE TROUBLESOME LICENSE CALENDAR

Licensed private applicators — individuals looking to apply regulated pesticides on personal property or their employer’s property — operate with a three-year license. After taking the initial examination to obtain a license, applicators may renew them every three years through an examination. Or, the individual may elect to take two hours of continuing education courses a year to maintain the license, pursuant to Chapter 206.5 of the Iowa Code.

Licenses and certifications expire Dec. 31, according to the code. The 2012 audit showed that the pesticide bureau’s practice is to administer the continuing education for private applicator certifications between January and April, so applicators fail to meet the requirements of completing six hours of continuing education within the three-year license period.

It works this way: an individual who passed an exam and received an initial private applicator license in March 2016 could apply pesticides through December 2018. If that person wanted to maintain the license through continuing education courses, he or she took courses when offered in the springs of 2017 and 2018. But the last continuing education course is available now, in 2019, after the license expired for failing to complete the six hours before the license expired.

“That program actually operates on a different year,” Paluch said. “It does not operate on the calendar year. It operates on a modified year due to the fact that farmers work in the field,” she said.

The audit report recommended the pesticide bureau reconcile the differences between the state code and the bureau’s administration, but the 2017 report again showed the practice had yet to be rectified.

The bureau’s response to the state auditor’s office in the 2017 report said changing the administrative rules would affect more than 23,000 people and the bureau’s education and certification programs, and would take more than a year to go into effect.

Office of Auditor of State, State of Iowa. Report released Aug. 15, 2017.

The Iowa auditor’s report covering the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship’s Pesticide Bureau found no major matters but expressed concerns about segregating duties and notes that the bureau is not fully funded with inspection fees.

MOST FEE INCREASES GO TO STATE GENERAL FUND

The 2012 state audit also showed that the cost of operating the bureau exceeded fees the bureau charges for its work. While the fees are not the bureau’s only source of income, the audit pointed out the fees had not changed since 1989. A few since have increased but income from all of the fees, other than dealer license fees and registration fees for products, go to Iowa’s general fund, not the pesticide bureau.

Lauren Shotwell/IowaWatch file photo

A sign warning pesticide applicators to avoid drifting or accidentally spraying his land. Photo taken in northeast Iowa.

“The code usually will set a fee, and if it does not set a fee it will allow the department through its administrative role process to set fees,” Jim Cunningham, with the Iowa State Auditor’s office, said. “One of the things that the department and the Legislature should always look at is are those fees covering the cost.“

Fees for the pesticide bureau are set by law in Chapter 206 of the Iowa Code. The bureau collects fees for commercial pesticide applicator licenses and certifications, dealers for pesticide retailers, registration of individual products that have to be registered at the state level, certification for private applicators who want to apply restricted use pesticides and civil penalties for misuse.

The bureau retained $43,350 in fees in fiscal 2018, which ended June 30, Dustin Vande Hoef, the agriculture and land stewardship department’s former communications director said. That was less than 2 percent of the bureau’s $2.6 million budget. An additional 69 percent of the bureau’s budget came from the state general fund and 29 percent from a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency grant.

Vande Hoef said the bureau has in the past requested more funds from the state to support its budget, but little has been done to restructure how the pesticide bureau is funded.

“In general, the Legislature has not been interested in changing that structure, especially if there would be an impact on the state’s general fund,” Vande Hoef wrote in an email to IowaWatch, before leaving his position with the department of agriculture on Jan. 4.

PENALTIES FOR SPRAY DRIFT

Paluch said civil penalties for pesticide misuse only apply to commercial pesticide applicators, or individuals who may have applied a pesticide to a drinking water source.

The maximum fine for pesticide misuse in Iowa, as stated by 45.102(4) of the Iowa Administrative Code, is $500, which Dennis Fett, an non-conventional farmer in Minden who raises peacocks, said is nothing more than a slap on the wrist. Fett filed three pesticide spray-drift complaints with the bureau in summer 2018. The complaints are grouped by the pesticide bureau as one complaint case that has yet to be closed.

Fett said he has contacted his local Sen. Tom Shipley (R-Nodaway), who is on the Senate Agriculture Committee, as well as Secretary of Agriculture and Land Stewardship Mike Naig, in the hopes of getting the Legislature to review the pesticide code in the 2019 legislative session and raise the civil penalty fines for pesticide misuse incidents.

“They don’t have enough laws, or teeth in their laws, to discourage misuse,” Fett said.

Harsher penalties such as other states impose, could generate more revenue for the bureau, Fett said.

Nebraska’s Pesticide Act for example, issues $15,000 maximum civil fine per occurrence of an incident violating the act’s rules and regulations. Illinois’ Pesticide Act details a point system to issue fines between $750 and $10,000, determined by how the act is violated and what happened as a result.

LEGISLATIVE ACTION

House File 617 passed in the Iowa 2017 legislative session made adjustments to the cost of dealer license fees, which the pesticide bureau gets to keep. It also removed a part of the code that allowed dealer licensees to choose to pay one-tenth of 1 percent of their gross pesticide sales if they sold less than $10,000 in retail sales. Now, these dealers must pay $10 for a license.

Lyle Muller/IowaWatch

Environmental researchers gather at a May 14, 2018, conference in Iowa City to share research about pesticide management.

The bill also raised delinquent fees for licensing fees from $10 to $25, or the cost of the original license fee if the gross pesticide sales are over $100,000.

Iowa Code 206 lists the following pesticide bureau requirements for applicator licenses and certifications. They have not been updated since the 2012 audit pointed out how old they are:

Applicator license – A license of not more than $25, as determined by the secretary of agriculture and land stewardship. This was last updated in 1974.

Applicator certification – For a commercial applicator, or someone who receives compensation for applying pesticides to another person’s property, $30 for a one year certification or $75 for a three-year certification. For a public applicator, or someone who is employed by a governmental agency to apply pesticides, $10 for a one-year certification and $15 for a three-year certification. This was last updated in 1987.

Private applicator certification – $15 fee for a three-year certification. This was last adjusted in 1989.

Cunningham said the agriculture and land stewardship department could take some steps to adjust its fees.

“They could present information that they have compiled to the Legislature to say these fees need to be changed,” he said. “But it would be ultimately up to the Legislature to make that decision based on the input from the departments.”

Staff reporter Lauren Wade’s work on this story was supported by the University of Northern Iowa Science in the Media project and the college student IowaWatch-Science in the Media fellowship program on which it collaborates with IowaWatch.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2019/01/23/years-later-little-action-on-recommendations-for-iowas-pesticide-inspections/feed/0Opinion: Has White House farm policy soured producers?https://investigatemidwest.org/2018/10/30/opinion-has-white-house-farm-policy-soured-producers/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2018/10/30/opinion-has-white-house-farm-policy-soured-producers/#respondWed, 31 Oct 2018 01:52:40 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=166402With the mid-term elections less than a week away we ask are these pragmatic farmers optimistic about the direction of all things ag over the past year.

]]>Something I learned pretty early in my career covering agriculture: You can't pull the wool over the eyes of farmers. And if you try to do so it's at your own peril.

So, with the mid-term elections less than a week away we ask are these pragmatic farmers optimistic about the direction of all things ag over the past year.

Well, the answer may be a resounding NO - especially for row crow farmers and pork producers.

Last month, Purdue University and CME Group released its latest sentiment among farmers and its bad news for the White House. Farmers sentiment for September hit rock bottom for 2018 and its lowest reading since October of 2016.

The Index of Future Expectations, fell 10 points and the Index of Current Conditions fell 25 points against the August reading.

When it comes to agriculture, the White House and GOP controlled Congress has generally ticked off farmers with its all-out tariff war with China, a NAFTA reboot (now called United States, Mexico, Canada Agreement) that may prove modestly helpful to U.S. dairy producers but gives nothing of significant to corn and soybean, corn, pork and cattle producers, and failure to move a new farm bill out of conference committee before it expired on October 1.

Front and center for the POTUS is trying to batter China into submission with increased tariff pressure.

In case you have forgotten – and farmers HAVE NOT – the U.S. has slapped $253 billion in tariffs on China. For its part, the People’s Republic of China has more than been willing to play tit-for-tat with $110 billion in tariffs against the U.S. including a 25 percent levy on U. S. soybeans.

China is frantically working to source soybeans from anywhere this growing season and have announced plans to cut imports for the 2018 crop year which opened October 1 from last year's 93.9 million tons to 83.65 million tons.

U.S. soybean farmers have lost roughly $2 a bushel. The White House – certainly with one eye on the elections – are trying to mitigate soybean producer ire with a promise to pay $1.65 a bushel on half of a farm's production. But that won't make soybean farmers whole.

It's even worse for corn farmers who will receive just one-half cent a bushel.

Perhaps that is partially why the White House announced recently that it is lifting a ban on summer sales of higher-ethanol blends of gasoline, in the hopes of driving down prices at the pump and increasing domestic corn usage.

Very early on, I knew it as a virtual certainty that Congress would miss its self-imposed October 1 deadline for delivering a farm bill to the president.

Since passage of the House and Senate versions of the farm bill talks among Agriculture Committee leaders have become tense. House Ag Chairman Mike Conaway and Senate Agriculture Committee ranking member Debbie Stabanow are locked in a political death struggle over Title I which covers farm subsidies.

Stabanow opposes Conaway's pet payout – a provision that would send roughly $500 million to cotton growers, a top Conaway constituency.

For his part Conaway absolutely despises elimination of $2 billion for rural utilities.

With the Conaway-Stabanow dustup in full swing, the farm bill conference committee has barely touched the other huge elephant in the room — SNAP.

The House bill contains new work requirements for SNAP recipients. Conaway has failed to budge an inch despite the obvious fact that the policy can't pass in the Senate. The votes are not there.

House ag members have gone home till the lame-duck session and it's becoming increasingly clear that Congress will have to pass a farm bill extension, creating uncertainty among farmers for the 2019 growing season.

Let's not mince words. Federal policy hasn't been kind to farmers in 2018. But next week, we'll find out if farmers are willing to be forgiving at the ballot box particularly in governor and state legislative races.

]]>https://investigatemidwest.org/2018/10/30/opinion-has-white-house-farm-policy-soured-producers/feed/0Opinion: China ready, willing and able to go head-to-head with U.S. in trade warhttps://investigatemidwest.org/2018/04/04/opinion-china-ready-willing-and-able-to-go-head-to-head-with-u-s-in-trade-war/
https://investigatemidwest.org/2018/04/04/opinion-china-ready-willing-and-able-to-go-head-to-head-with-u-s-in-trade-war/#respondWed, 04 Apr 2018 20:11:25 +0000http://investigatemidwest.org/?p=120290As Dave Dickey writes, U.S. grain and oilseed farmers, specialty crop growers and pork producers are hoping that China and U.S. leadership pull back their reins on the potential for a full-blown trade war that could cripple U.S. gross domestic product.

U.S. grain and oilseed farmers, specialty crop growers and pork producers are hoping that China and U.S. leadership pull back their reins on the potential for a full blown trade war that could cripple U.S. gross domestic product.

But the tariffs have apparently opened Pandora's Box, sparking a flurry of Chinese retaliatory tariffs on a wide range of U.S. agricultural products. Beijing raised tariffs on pork, aluminum scrap and some other products by 25 percent and 15 percent tariffs have been imposed on U.S. apples and almonds.

But with more of its population moving into urban centers, China is in the process of moving toward large scale animal operations and has become the world's largest importer of pork while building the needed infrastructure. It's a five-year plan.

Unfortunately for U.S. pork producers, it's more likely the trade war is quickly escalating.

The POTUS and the Office of the Trade Representative Tuesday doubled down on the steel/aluminum tariff threat, targeting roughly 1,300 Chinese medical, transport and industrial technology products to send a message to Beijing – stop stealing U.S. intellectual property.

China's response was swift and brutal to U.S. agricultural interests, today announcing 25 percent tariffs on U.S. soybeans, as well as cars and airplanes. In total, the latest Chinese tariffs will cover 106 categories and are worth – are you paying attention America – $50 billion dollars.

No one knows where all this is going, and if they say they do take it with a huge grain of salt.

At this point the U.S. is slow rolling its tariff threat.

The Office of the United States Trade Representative will publish the proposed punitive tariffs in the Federal Register and open a 30-day public comment period. The federal office also says it will give China a 60-day window before the tariffs take effect.

I expect there will be serious dialog over the next two months, but if talks go poorly, as it stands right now, American agriculture will be a huge loser.

China imported some $12.3 billion worth of U.S. soybeans last year.

In the short term, China will try to turn to Brazil's massive bin busting soybean crop to fill the gap. The March World Supply and Demand Estimates put Brazil's soy at 113 million tons.

However complicating China's soybean supply line is a severe drought in Argentina; the nation has less than 7 million tons of soybeans to export – its smallest total in a decade.

China could also draw soybeans from the government's emergency strategic reserves.

Would this be effective? Only China knows for sure as it does not publish how many tons are in it.

China could also attempt to change the mix of ingredients that go into feed. But that may be easier said than done.

Adding more dried distillers grain is a possibility, but China already has stiff tariffs in place on DDGs.

Ultimately the threat against U.S. pork and soybeans is an attempt to hurt the POTUS by inflicting pain on the base that got him elected.

Buckle in.

The next 60 days will be crucial to U.S. ag interests.

About Dave Dickey

Dave Dickey

Dickey spent nearly 30 years at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s NPR member station WILL-AM 580 where he won a dozen Associated Press awards for his reporting. For 13 years, he directed Illinois Public Media’s agriculture programming. His weekly column for Big Ag Watch covers agriculture and related issues including politics, government, environment and labor. Email him at dave.dickey@investigatemidwest.org.

This column reflects the writer’s own opinions and not those of Big Ag Watch.